


Milestones

by collapsethelightintoearth



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Charlie Bradbury & Dean Winchester Friendship, Charlie-centric, Coming Out, Dean Has a Sexuality Crisis, F/F, Internalized Homophobia, John is a good father, M/M, Mild Angst, No Supernatural Elements, Supernatural AU - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-16
Updated: 2014-01-16
Packaged: 2018-01-08 23:50:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 498
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1138937
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/collapsethelightintoearth/pseuds/collapsethelightintoearth
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Charlie wasn’t always okay with the fact that she likes girls. Self-acceptance was a long and arduous road. Years later, she looks at Dean and sees something of herself in him.</p><p>(A Supernatural AU in which there's nothing supernatural, John is a good father, and Charlie moves in with the Winchesters after being disowned by her parents)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Milestones

Charlie wasn’t always okay with the fact that she likes girls. After all, her parents were conservative, devout Catholics. Years of methodical social conditioning cleverly disguised as Sunday school and Bible camp weren’t exactly conductive to acceptance of her sexuality. Nor was the disownment by her parents when she finally mustered up the courage to tell them at fifteen years old.  

She had ended up moving in with her best friends, Dean and Sam Winchester. Charlie will always remember that day, not only because it was the start of a new era, but for their father’s unexpected kindness. He had pulled her aside and said, “I know why your parents kicked you out, Charlie.” Before she could stutter out denials, he had continued with, “And I can assure you that it won’t be a problem here.” John had smiled at her, warm and reassuring. After he left the room to go make dinner, she realized something. He had been the first person to accept her sexual orientation. 

He wasn’t the last.

Charlie went off to college with Sam two and a half years later. She knew what people said about college, about the nature of it being a fresh start— that you could be anyone. Anyone in the world. Anyone you wanted to be. Charlie made a decision— she was going to be no one but herself.

A month into her first semester, Charlie met her first girlfriend, Liz. Everything changed after that. Self-acceptance was a gradual process, and she counted every milestone. The first time she and Liz went on a date, the first time they held hands in public. The first time she kissed Liz and not the other way around. 

Years later, she watches Dean watch Castiel. In Dean’s eyes, she sees herself as a young girl, then as a teenager. Falling in love with her first real friend, Becky, and not saying _anything_. Hearing some asshole jeering at two guys holding hands, and leering at two women doing the same. Staring down at her own hands, folded in her lap to keep from shaking. Feeling the hot burn of shame course through her like a wildfire, destroying everything in its path. She can almost _feel_ the internalized homophobia in the slope of Dean’s spine as he hunches in on himself. 

Charlie knows that this is something Dean will have to work out for himself. 

So she continues to watch, waits for change. Change comes one seemingly unremarkable day. They’re all watching a movie, some stupid romantic comedy. Charlie kind of just wishes they had gone with _Harry Potter._ Or at _least_ something a bit more sci-fi. She’s pulled out of her moping by something in her peripheral vision. She focuses on it, and just in time catches Dean reaching out to grasp Castiel’s hand in his own. She watches their fingers intertwine. Charlie looks away, unable to stop the smile that breaks out over her face. Makes a note to herself: ‘ _milestone number one_ ’.


End file.
